‘You must never come here again,’ said he, ‘for, once having asked so much, how will you in future be content with smaller gifts?’
Dorani bowed her head silently as she took the lute, and passed with the fairy out of the great gate, where the stool awaited them. More unsteadily than before, it flew back to earth.
When Dorani got to the palace that morning she asked the prince whether he had dreamt again. He laughed with happiness, for this time she had spoken to him of her own free will; and he replied:
‘No; but I begin to dream now—not of what has happened in the past, but of what may happen in the future.’
That day Dorani sat very quietly, but she answered the prince when he spoke to her; and when evening fell, and with it the time for her departure, she still sat on. Then the prince came close to her and said softly:
‘Are you not going to your house, Dorani?’
At that she rose and threw herself weeping into his arms, whispering gently:
‘Never again, my lord, never again would I leave thee!’
So the prince won his beautiful bride; and though they neither of them dealt any further with fairies and their magic, they learnt more daily of the magic of Love, which one may still learn, although fairy magic has fled away.
(Punjâbi Story, Major Campbell, Feroshepore.)